For the Nobel prize-winner Amartya Sen, a good society is one populated by individuals with the capability to choose and construct good lives. His political philosophy, recently synthesised in his book The Idea of Justice is based on the need for each citizen to have broad enough set of ‘capabilities’ to be ‘responsible for their own wellbeing’. Sen defines a capability as ‘the power to do something’ and in this lecture he will examine how ideas of justice relate to ideas of power, capability and democracy.

At a time when confidence in many of the institutions of economic and political life has been ebbing, Sen will argue for a people-focused, rather than an institutionalist view of democracy and power. As he writes: “The working of democratic institutions, like that of all other institutions, depends on the activities of human agents.”

A topical lecture from one of the world’s great public intellectuals. Please join us for this unique webcast!

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After the speech there will be a live question and answer session for the live and online audience. You can email questions from anywhere in the world, and chosen questions will be read out.

Demos is a think tank focused on power and politics. We develop and spread ideas to give people more power over their own lives. Our vision is of a democracy of powerful citizens, with an equal stake in society.